Dead Royal Oak man named in $4M lawsuit

A man found dead of a gunshot wound on the lobby floor of a Royal Oak condo building where he lived owned a large roofing company that was sued by the Carpenters Pension Fund for more than $4 million.

The lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Detroit was dismissed several months ago after process servers for the pension fund were unable to find the man ó Randy Michael Bergeron, 61 ó to serve him with a subpoena, court records show.

A process server went to Bergeronís former house in Farmington Hills on Dec. 12, 2012, but no one answered the door. When the server returned four days later, he found the house burned down and the lot vacant, according to court documents.

Bergeronís body was found at the Main Street Lofts, 111 N. Main, about 11:45 a.m. Monday in what police said was an apparent accidental shooting with his own registered handgun.

Royal Oak Deputy Police Chief Gordon Young said Bergeron died of a gunshot wound to his chest.

ďItís still an open case,Ē Young said. ďThe gunshot was from his .40-caliber semiautomatic Beretta. His gun was found next to his body.Ē

A person found Bergeron lying on the floor in an area where there are mailboxes for the condominium owners. He was pronounced dead at the scene by the Oakland County Medical Examiner.

The medical examinerís office completed an autopsy Tuesday listing the gunshot wound as the cause of death. But the autopsy report left undetermined whether the death was accidental until after police finish their investigation.

Police said they were unsure whether Bergeron was arriving or leaving the building when he died. Young said police at this point are unwilling to describe how the business owner may have accidentally shot himself.

Bergeron was the owner and president of two companies ó Century Truss and Century Truss of Michigan.

Bergeron was sued late last year in U.S. District Court by the Carpenters Pension Trust Fund in the Detroit area. The fundís trustees charged that Bergeron failed to pay sufficient pension fund liabilities of about $4.7 million.

The fund claimed Bergeron owed the money after he laid off all the carpenters he employed and withdrew from the pension fund without paying the money he was liable for, court papers show.

U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg dismissed the lawsuit in April after process servers working for the pension fundís legal team were unable to find Bergeron and serve him with a subpoena.

Besides the two failed attempts to serve Bergeron at his house, servers also unsuccessfully tried to serve subpoenas at addresses for his business locations in December.

Century Truss of Michigan was out of business and moved from one location in Brighton when a process server went there, according to a current business at that location. The server tried a second location in Brighton for the business, but found the building closed in December, according to court records.

Similarly, the Century Truss business was gone from a Farmington Hills address when a process server went there in December. A second attempt to serve the company a subpoena at an address in Brighton also was unsuccessful.

Berg ruled in dismissing the pension fundís lawsuit that the fund had failed to subpoena Bergeron or his companies within the required 120 days. He faulted the fundís legal team for failing to make further attempts to serve a subpoena in the three months after Jan. 17, according to court records.

Still, Berg ruled that the pension fund could re-file the lawsuit in the future and start the process again.

The lawyer representing the pension fund has left the law firm that is handling the lawsuit.

The law firm failed to return a phone call Tuesday seeking comment on the case.

Royal Oak police, meanwhile, are still seeking information from witnesses as their investigation of Bergeronís death continues.